Pink gender timeline

Book project

PINK CODE

PINK RIBBONS

„What are young women made of? Ribbons and laces, and sweet pretty faces.“
--Rimbault, 1846, in: Opie Dictionary Nursary Rhymes, p. 117.

„Attitude is the mind’s paintbrush. It can color any situation.“ --Sallie Burdine, cited in Barbara Delinksy: Uplift. Secrets from the Sisterhood of Breast Cancer Survivors, p. 278.

Breast cancer advocacy’s soft pink awareness ribbon draws on codes of gender and consumption that have been passed down through nursery rhymes such as “sugar, spice, and all that’s nice” since the early 19th century. Indeed, the rhyme’s verse „RIBBONS and laces, and sweet pretty faces“ underscores how RIBBONS have tied (certain) women to sweetness, good humor and prettiness for nearly two hundred years.

© 2013 by DOMINIQUE GRISARD. All rights reserved.

[work in progress]

Power of color